Project Triangle Strategy Demo First Impressions

During yesterday’s Nintendo Direct, Square Enix revealed a brand new game! It a strategy rpg that has a working title of Project Triangle Strategy. Not only that but a demo was released for the game! I downloaded the demo and now have some thoughts on it.

Project Triangle Strategy looks a lot like Octopath Traveler. There are some aspects of the game, such as the exploration and finding items, that are like Octopath. There are a lot of differences though.

Let’s talk about the battle system first!

I love Final Fantasy Tactics.  And the battle system in Project Triangle reminds me so much of Tactics. The square based layout, the regular attacks, the in-game camera movement, and even some of the special attacks are very similar to the Square Enix classic. There are some differences such as the lines that let you know if an enemy can target you and some different menu layouts. Each character seems to have a job but there is no sign of a job system in this demo (so far at least).

Its a very good battle system though and fans of tactical rpgs, especially Final Fantasy Tactics, should get excited for this game.

Also, in this demo at least, the battles are not easy. There is so much strategy to this game. There doesn’t appear to be any random battles in the demo. I hope in the finished game that you will be able to take on random battles in between cutscenes.

Speaking of cutscenes, there are a ton of them. There is so much talking (some voice acting too). This is also like Final Fantasy Tactics. The story is also very war focused and not at all for kids. It seems like an interesting story but sometimes I wish they’d stop talking.

The demo throws you right into the middle of the story. It does explain some of what is going on, though its a pretty complicated story and I won’t try to explain it…

One of the  things that I’d like to point out is the choices you make. Project Triangle has some kind of morality system and the direction of the game (who is in your party at least) will change based on what choices you make. There are some interesting choices here. I plan to replay the demo and see if making different choices changes the direction of the story and/or recruit of characters. I’ll let you know in another article.

I’m not sure how much longer I have on the demo. I just ran into my second battle, after a lot of cutscenes, and lost it badly. I will have to rethink my strategy and try again. I plan to finish the whole thing and write another article with more thoughts.

So far, I like Project Triangle a lot. The story seems interesting, the battle system is amazing, the exploration is good, and the graphics are perhaps better than Octopath. I do wish there were less talking and more battles. I also really hope there’s a job system in the final game. Time will tell.

Have you downloaded the Project Triangle Strategy demo? What do you think of it?